Lesson 5 - Jesus Christ is the Son of Heavenly Father

This was a difficult week for me.  I didn't have much time to prepare, and so I sort of "winged it".  (I pulled activities from previous weeks that sort of fit, as well as followed the manual without many visuals or hands-on materials.)  This was not a good idea with young children.  Being prepared is essential to maintain a good flow for sustained attention, to know where you are in the lesson and where you're going, and to be able to anticipate and deal with challenges.  When you aren't prepared, you end up focusing more on what you are doing, and it's easy to miss the signs of inattentiveness, or not be able to handle those signs.  You can only really focus on one thing at a time.  As a result, it's easy to lose control of the class.  And that's exactly what happened.

So, this week's lesson wasn't one of my best.  I ended up having to correct a lot of behaviors.  It wasn't at all enjoyable.  I was frustrated and dissatisfied.  But it was my problem, not the children's.

Some things I did...

• I used the Plan of Salvation visuals I used last week.  I put them up on the board and reviewed the Plan.  But I should've done something different. I didn't involve the children.  I didn't have a clear goal for using the visuals.
• I used some visuals for the nativity that I found the end of last year (I will post about these later in the year).  This went OK, but again, without the preparation and thoughtful purpose, I didn't involve the children in ways that I could have, and somewhat lost their interest.
• We sang the song "Away in a Manger".  Better... except some of the kids didn't know the words.  When children don't know the words, it's hard for them to stay engaged if there is nothing to help hold their attention.
• Using the picture of Jesus being baptized, I told how Jesus was baptized.  Again, did not involve interaction.
• We sang the song "Tell Me the Stories of Jesus". Same problem as discussed above.
• Animal matching game (from Lesson 1).  The children enjoyed the game, but I tried to make the connection with this lesson by saying we were matching dads and babies.  That didn't work, because the person was obviously a mother, and (to me, anyway) many of the animal pictures were obviously mothers also.  The idea would have worked, but I should have made picture cards showing dads to replace the moms.  So although it was fun, and engaged the children, the connection wasn't there.  That connection is important for learning.  So the meaning of this activity may have been lost.
• For coloring, I again used the black and white poster from Sunday Savers.

So, I will post better ideas on this lesson next year, after I've had a chance to prepare properly.